Release Date: May 15, 2009

(out of 4)

French import "Summer Hours" is an unusually thoughtful film. Three grown siblings attend their mom’s 75th birthday. One brother remains in France. The other brother travels from Hong Kong. The sister has flown in from New York. They rarely get together anymore but they said they wish they would. Helene (Edith Scob), the mother, pulls aside her son Frederic to discuss the estate. To discuss such touchy and dismal matters makes him ill at ease. Helene continues to discuss the inventory of paintings, tea sets, vases and armoires. Frederic, who clearly loves his mother, cringes in the face of being held with the responsibility as the executor of the estate.

What an interesting and energizing mom Helene really is, she encompasses everything cool within a distinguished and revered mom whom has acquired a lifetime of wisdom and astute humor. Despite there being no apparent illnesses, Helene will not live to her 76th birthday. The next time the children meet they will discuss the fate of the country house. The country house has been a large part of their lives, so they will do what they can to preserve it. Right?

Frederic (Charles Berling) thinks it is very likely that his children would like to use it for holidays. Jeremie (Jeremie Renier) has children, too, and the house was meaningful to him – as you can understand and likely relate to it is the key to their upbringing. But he announces that his company is going to station him in Hong Kong permanently. Frederic asks how Jeremie’s children are going to adjust to a foreign language. Jeremie says, “They’ll learn.” Adrienne (Juliette Binoche) is not going to leave New York. She announces that she is going to marry and permanently reside in the States. Frederic had thought out on how to be fair in how to divvy up access to the house. But now it sounds like he will be the only one that would get use out of it. Jeremie and Adrienne propose that they will benefit only if the house is sold.

It’s not accurate to call the film’s style impersonal, but the characters veer off to obscure directions as the estate’s objects and pieces takes precedence in preparation for an estate auction. Frederic is sad that things will never again be intact. But he is in charge making sure art pieces get sold, that the right persons inherit certain objects, and that the housemaid gets a fair severance. Helene’s uncle was an artist so many of the house’s objects have value. Unfortunately the children will be taxed by the state upon any sale because Helene failed to get a proper trust finalized.

When it’s all over there is a certain melancholy attributed to the drama. The house will not be there for family reunions. Visits between siblings will become rare. The three of them will go on to build their own families. Frederic is more heartbroken than anybody else that things have grown apart. Olivier Assayas (“Demonlover,” “Clean”) wrote and directed – he’s never been one much attuned to warmth but he finds subdued pathos with Frederic. He also ends the picture on a bittersweet note with a kind of unforeseen gesture that embraces the happiness and the joy of letting oneself be young.